Game AI Pro2: Collected Wisdom of Game AI Professionals presents cutting-edge tips, tricks, and techniques for artificial intelligence (AI) in games, drawn from developers of shipped commercial games as well as some of the best-known academics in the field. It contains knowledge, advice, hard-earned wisdom, and insights gathered from across the community of developers and researchers who have devoted themselves to game AI. In this book, 47 expert developers and researchers have come together to bring you their newest advances in game AI, along with twists on proven techniques that have shipped in some of the most successful commercial games of the last few years. The book provides a toolbox of proven techniques that can be applied to many common and not-so-common situations. It is written to be accessible to a broad range of readers. Beginners will find good general coverage of game AI techniques and a number of comprehensive overviews, while intermediate to expert professional game developers will find focused, deeply technical chapters on specific topics of interest to them. Covers a wide range of AI in games, with topics applicable to almost any game Touches on most, if not all, of the topics necessary to get started in game AI Provides real-life case studies of game AI in published commercial games Gives in-depth, technical solutions from some of the industry's best-known games Includes downloadable demos and/or source code, available at http://www.gameaipro.com

A synthesis of more than ten years of experience, Remote Sensing Image Fusion covers methods specifically designed for remote sensing imagery. The authors supply a comprehensive classification system and rigorous mathematical description of advanced and state-of-the-art methods for pansharpening of multispectral images, fusion of hyperspectral and panchromatic images, and fusion of data from heterogeneous sensors such as optical and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images and integration of thermal and visible/near-infrared images. They also explore new trends of signal/image processing, such as compressive sensing and sparse signal representations. The book brings a new perspective to a multidisciplinary research field that is becoming increasingly articulate and comprehensive. It fosters signal/image processing methodologies toward the goal of information extraction, either by humans or by machines, from remotely sensed images. The authors explain how relatively simple processing methods tailored to the specific features of the images may be winning in terms of reliable performance over more complex algorithms based on mathematical theories and models unconstrained from the physical behaviors of the instruments. Ultimately, the book covers the births and developments of three generations of RS image fusion. Established textbooks are mainly concerned with the earliest generation of methods. This book focuses on second generation methods you can use now and new trends that may become third generation methods. Only the lessons learned with second generation methods will be capable of fostering the excellence among the myriad of methods that are proposed almost every day by the scientific literature.

This book focuses on the fundamentals and recent advances in RGB-D imaging as well as covering a range of RGB-D applications. The topics covered include: data acquisition, data quality assessment, filling holes, 3D reconstruction, SLAM, multiple depth camera systems, segmentation, object detection, salience detection, pose estimation, geometric modelling, fall detection, autonomous driving, motor rehabilitation therapy, people counting and cognitive service robots. The availability of cheap RGB-D sensors has led to an explosion over the last five years in the capture and application of colour plus depth data. The addition of depth data to regular RGB images vastly increases the range of applications, and has resulted in a demand for robust and real-time processing of RGB-D data. There remain many technical challenges, and RGB-D image processing is an ongoing research area. This book covers the full state of the art, and consists of a series of chapters by internationally renowned experts in the field. Each chapter is written so as to provide a detailed overview of that topic. RGB-D Image Analysis and Processing will enable both students and professional developers alike to quickly get up to speed with contemporary techniques, and apply RGB-D imaging in their own projects.

Advances in technology have enabled animators and video game designers to design increasingly realistic, human-like characters in animation and games. Although it was intended that this increased realism would allow viewers to appreciate the emotional state of characters, research has shown that audiences often have a negative reaction as the human likeness of a character increases. This phenomenon, known as the Uncanny Valley, has become a benchmark for measuring if a character is believably realistic and authentically human like. This book is an essential guide on how to overcome the Uncanny Valley phenomenon when designing human-like characters in digital applications. In this book, the author provides a synopsis of literature about the Uncanny Valley phenomenon and explains how it was introduced into contemporary thought. She then presents her theories on its possible psychological causes based on a series of empirical studies. The book focuses on how aspects of facial expression and speech can be manipulated to overcome the Uncanny Valley in character design. The Uncanny Valley in Games and Animation presents a novel theory that goes beyond previous research in that the cause of the Uncanny Valley is based on a perceived lack of empathy in a character. This book makes an original, scholarly contribution to our current understanding of the Uncanny Valley phenomenon and fills a gap in the literature by assessing the biological and social roots of the Uncanny Valley and its implications for computer-graphics animation.

This book provides a broad overview of both the technical challenges in sensor network development, and the real-world applications of distributed sensing. Important aspects of distributed computing in large-scale networked sensor systems are analyzed in the context of human behavior understanding, including topics on systems design tools and techniques. Additionally, the book examines a varied range of applications. Features: contains valuable contributions from an international selection of leading experts in the field; presents a high-level introduction to the aims and motivations underpinning distributed sensing; describes decision-making algorithms in the presence of complex sensor networks; provides a detailed analysis of the design, implementation, and development of a distributed network of homogeneous or heterogeneous sensors; reviews the application of distributed sensing to human behavior understanding and autonomous intelligent vehicles; includes a helpful glossary and a list of acronyms.

Motivated by a variational model concerning the depth of the objects in a picture and the problem of hidden and illusory contours, this book investigates one of the central problems of computer vision: the topological and algorithmic reconstruction of a smooth three dimensional scene starting from the visible part of an apparent contour. The authors focus their attention on the manipulation of apparent contours using a finite set of elementary moves, which correspond to diffeomorphic deformations of three dimensional scenes. A large part of the book is devoted to the algorithmic part, with implementations, experiments, and computed examples. The book is intended also as a user's guide to the software code appcontour, written for the manipulation of apparent contours and their invariants. This book is addressed to theoretical and applied scientists working in the field of mathematical models of image segmentation.

Expand your imagination by letting go of the limitations of traditional animation mediums, software packages, or workflows and integrating 2D and 3D assets. With the updated and expanded second edition of Hybrid Animation you'll learn how to choose the techniques that best express the artistic and narrative direction of your project and get the technical support you need to bring your ideas to life. Learn how different pipelines of hybrid animation can be broken down and rethought in different packages. Does the 3D character lead a 2D character? Or, does the 2D character have 3D parts? Perhaps a 3D prop is interacting with a 2D character? All of these hybrid patterns are explored from high end to open source software. By the end of the book you'll be able to see how to apply these techniques to the software you have now. Insight and inspiration are at your fingertips with exercises, step-by-step tutorials and featured interviews with Todd Render of Floyd County Productions and Marty Altman, former CGI Technical Director at Walt Disney Feature Animation. Features: Now with updated software methodologies, new tricks, and expanded sections on Toon Boom Animate Pro, Toon Boom Harmony and more. Produce high-quality 2D and 3D narratives in a variety of software workflows, including Photoshop, Corel, Flash, After Effects and Maya, Nuke, Houdini, Smoke, and Toon Boom workflows. Think critically about visual styles, the effects of 2D/3D overlaying and the entire pipeline from start to finish. Explore additional chapters and over 6 gigs of sample files available in the companion data found at www.hybridanimation.com Tina O'Hailey is Dean of Digital Media at the Savannah College of Art and Design with locations in: Atlanta, Savannah and Hong Kong. Having worked for Electronic Arts, Walt Disney Feature Animation, she has extensive experience in feature animation and game development. O'Hailey has served as an Artist Development Trainer for Brother Bear (2003), Lilo and Stitch (2003), Mulan (1998) and Prince of Egypt (1998).

Image and video signals require large transmission bandwidth and storage, leading to high costs. The data must be compressed without a loss or with a small loss of quality. Thus, efficient image and video compression algorithms play a significant role in the storage and transmission of data. Image and Video Compression: Fundamentals, Techniques, and Applications explains the major techniques for image and video compression and demonstrates their practical implementation using MATLAB (R) programs. Designed for students, researchers, and practicing engineers, the book presents both basic principles and real practical applications. In an accessible way, the book covers basic schemes for image and video compression, including lossless techniques and wavelet- and vector quantization-based image compression and digital video compression. The MATLAB programs enable readers to gain hands-on experience with the techniques. The authors provide quality metrics used to evaluate the performance of the compression algorithms. They also introduce the modern technique of compressed sensing, which retains the most important part of the signal while it is being sensed.

The three volume set provides a systematic overview of theories and technique on social network analysis.Volume 2 of the set mainly focuses on the formation and interaction of group behaviors. Users' behavior analysis, sentiment analysis, influence analysis and collective aggregation are discussed in detail as well. It is an essential reference for scientist and professionals in computer science.

A rare look at the role of special effects in creating fictional worlds and transmedia franchises From comic book universes crowded with soaring superheroes and shattering skyscrapers to cosmic empires set in far-off galaxies, today's fantasy blockbusters depend on visual effects. Bringing science fiction from the studio to your screen, through film, television, or video games, these special effects power our entertainment industry. More Than Meets the Eye delves into the world of fantastic media franchises to trace the ways in which special effects over the last 50 years have become central not just to transmedia storytelling but to worldbuilding, performance, and genre in contemporary blockbuster entertainment. More Than Meets the Eye maps the ways in which special effects build consistent storyworlds and transform genres while traveling from one media platform to the next. Examining high-profile franchises in which special effects have played a constitutive role such as Star Trek, Star Wars, The Matrix, and The Lord of the Rings, as well as more contemporary franchises like Pirates of the Caribbean and Harry Potter, Bob Rehak analyzes the ways in which production practices developed alongside the cultural work of industry professionals. By studying social and cultural factors such as fan interaction, this book provides a context for understanding just how much multiplatform storytelling has come to define these megahit franchises. More Than Meets the Eye explores the larger history of how physical and optical effects in postwar Hollywood laid the foundation for modern transmedia franchises and argues that special effects are not simply an adjunct to blockbuster filmmaking, but central agents of an entire mode of production.

Obtain the Best Estimate of a Strongly Scattering Object from Limited Scattered Field Data Introduction to Imaging from Scattered Fields presents an overview of the challenging problem of determining information about an object from measurements of the field scattered from that object. It covers widely used approaches to recover information about the objects and examines the assumptions made a priori about the object and the consequences of recovering object information from limited numbers of noisy measurements of the scattered fields. The book explores the strengths and weaknesses of using inverse methods for weak scattering. These methods, including Fourier-based signal and image processing techniques, allow more straightforward inverse algorithms to be exploited based on a simple mapping of scattered field data. The authors also discuss their recent approach based on a nonlinear filtering step in the inverse algorithm. They illustrate how to use this algorithm through numerous two-dimensional electromagnetic scattering examples. MATLAB (R) code is provided to help readers quickly apply the approach to a wide variety of inverse scattering problems. In later chapters of the book, the authors focus on important and often forgotten overarching constraints associated with exploiting inverse scattering algorithms. They explain how the number of degrees of freedom associated with any given scattering experiment can be found and how this allows one to specify a minimum number of data that should be measured. They also describe how the prior discrete Fourier transform (PDFT) algorithm helps in estimating the properties of an object from scattered field measurements. The PDFT restores stability and improves estimates of the object even with severely limited data (provided it is sufficient to meet a criterion based on the number of degrees of freedom). Suitable for graduate students and researchers working on medical, geophysical, defense, and industrial inspection inverse problems, this self-contained book provides the necessary details for readers to design improved experiments and process measured data more effectively. It shows how to obtain the best estimate of a strongly scattering object from limited scattered field data.

Expand your imagination by letting go of the limitations of traditional animation mediums, software packages, or workflows and integrating 2D and 3D assets. With the updated and expanded second edition of Hybrid Animation you'll learn how to choose the techniques that best express the artistic and narrative direction of your project and get the technical support you need to bring your ideas to life. Learn how different pipelines of hybrid animation can be broken down and rethought in different packages. Does the 3D character lead a 2D character? Or, does the 2D character have 3D parts? Perhaps a 3D prop is interacting with a 2D character? All of these hybrid patterns are explored from high end to open source software. By the end of the book you'll be able to see how to apply these techniques to the software you have now. Insight and inspiration are at your fingertips with exercises, step-by-step tutorials and featured interviews with Todd Render of Floyd County Productions and Marty Altman, former CGI Technical Director at Walt Disney Feature Animation. Features: Now with updated software methodologies, new tricks, and expanded sections on Toon Boom Animate Pro, Toon Boom Harmony and more. Produce high-quality 2D and 3D narratives in a variety of software workflows, including Photoshop, Corel, Flash, After Effects and Maya, Nuke, Houdini, Smoke, and Toon Boom workflows. Think critically about visual styles, the effects of 2D/3D overlaying and the entire pipeline from start to finish. Explore additional chapters and over 6 gigs of sample files available in the companion data found at www.hybridanimation.com Tina O'Hailey is Dean of Digital Media at the Savannah College of Art and Design with locations in: Atlanta, Savannah and Hong Kong. Having worked for Electronic Arts, Walt Disney Feature Animation, she has extensive experience in feature animation and game development. O'Hailey has served as an Artist Development Trainer for Brother Bear (2003), Lilo and Stitch (2003), Mulan (1998) and Prince of Egypt (1998).

Drawn to Life is a two-volume collection of the legendary lectures of long-time Disney animator Walt Stanchfield. For over 20 years, Walt mentored a new generation of animators at the Walt Disney Studios and influenced such talented artists such as Tim Burton, Brad Bird, Glen Keane, and Andreas Deja. His writing and drawings have become must-have lessons for fine artists, film professionals, animators, and students looking for inspiration and essential training in drawing and the art of animation. Written by Walt Stanchfield (1919–2000), who began work for the Walt Disney Studios in the 1950s. His work can be seen in films such as Sleeping Beauty, The Jungle Book, 101 Dalmatians, and Peter Pan. Edited by Disney Legend and Oscar®-nominated producer Don Hahn, whose credits include the classic Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, and Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Tackle the Challenges of Parallel Programming in the Visual Effects Industry In Multithreading for Visual Effects, developers from DreamWorks Animation, Pixar, Side Effects, Intel, and AMD share their successes and failures in the messy real-world application area of production software. They provide practical advice on multithreading techniques and visual effects used in popular visual effects libraries (such as Bullet, OpenVDB, and OpenSubdiv), one of the industry's leading visual effects packages (Houdini), and proprietary animation systems. This information is valuable not just to those in the visual effects arena, but also to developers of high performance software looking to increase performance of their code. Diverse Solutions to Solve Performance Problems After an introductory chapter, each subsequent chapter presents a case study that illustrates how the authors used multithreading techniques to achieve better performance. The authors discuss the problems that occurred and explain how they solved them. The case studies encompass solutions for shaving milliseconds, solutions for optimizing longer running tasks, multithreading techniques for modern CPU architectures, and massive parallelism using GPUs. Some of the case studies include open source projects so you can try out these techniques for yourself and see how well they work.

Biomedical / Electrical Engineering Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing Volume II: Dynamic Analysis and Modeling A volume in the IEEE Press Series on Biomedical Engineering Metin Akay, Series Editor Featuring current contributions by experts in signal processing and biomedical engineering, this book introduces the concepts, recent advances, and implementations of nonlinear dynamic analysis methods. Together with Volume I in this series, this book provides comprehensive coverage of nonlinear signal and image processing techniques. Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing: Volume II combines analytical and biological expertise in the original mathematical simulation and modeling of physiological systems. Detailed discussions of the analysis of steady-state and dynamic systems, discrete-time system theory, and discrete modeling of continuous-time systems are provided. Biomedical examples include the analysis of the respiratory control system, the dynamics of cardiac muscle and the cardiorespiratory function, and neural firing patterns in auditory and vision systems. Examples include relevant MATLAB(r) and Pascal programs. Topics covered include:
* Nonlinear dynamics
* Behavior and estimation
* Modeling of biomedical signals and systems
* Heart rate variability measures, models, and signal assessments
* Origin of chaos in cardiovascular and gastric myoelectrical activity
* Measurement of spatio-temporal dynamics of human epileptic seizures.
A valuable reference book for medical researchers, medical faculty, and advanced graduate students, it is also essential reading for practicing biomedical engineers. Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing, Volume II is anexcellent companion to Dr. Akay's Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing, Volume I: Fuzzy Logic, Neural Networks, and New Algorithms.

A timely and authoritative guide to the state of the art of wave scattering

Scattering of Electromagnetic Waves offers in three volumes a complete and up-to-date treatment of wave scattering by random discrete scatterers and rough surfaces. Written by leading scientists who have made important contributions to wave scattering over three decades, this new work explains the principles, methods, and applications of this rapidly expanding, interdisciplinary field. It covers both introductory and advanced material and provides students and researchers in remote sensing as well as imaging, optics, and electromagnetic theory with a one-stop reference to a wealth of current research results. Plus, Scattering of Electromagnetic Waves contains detailed discussions of both analytical and numerical methods, including cutting-edge techniques for the recovery of earth/land parametric information.

The three volumes are entitled respectively Theories and Applications, Numerical Simulation, and Advanced Topics. In the second volume, Numerical Simulations, Leung Tsang (University of Washington) Jin Au Kong (MIT), Kung-Hau Ding (Air Force Research Lab), and Chi On Ao (MIT) cover:

• Layered media simulations
• Rough surface and volume scattering simulations
• Dense media models and simulations
• Electromagnetic scattering by discrete scatterers and a buried object
• Scattering by vertical cylinders above a surface
• Electromagnetic waves scattering by vegetation
• Computational methods and programs used for performing various simulations

Quad Rotorcraft Control develops original control methods for the navigation and hovering flight of an autonomous mini-quad-rotor robotic helicopter. These methods use an imaging system and a combination of inertial and altitude sensors to localize and guide the movement of the unmanned aerial vehicle relative to its immediate environment.
The history, classification and applications of UAVs are introduced, followed by a description of modelling techniques for quad-rotors and the experimental platform itself. A control strategy for the improvement of attitude stabilization in quad-rotors is then proposed and tested in real-time experiments. The strategy, based on the use low-cost components and with experimentally-established robustness, avoids drift in the UAV s angular position by the addition of an internal control loop to each electronic speed controller ensuring that, during hovering flight, all four motors turn at almost the same speed. The quad-rotor s Euler angles being very close to the origin, other sensors like GPS or image-sensing equipment can be incorporated to perform autonomous positioning or trajectory-tracking tasks.
Two vision-based strategies, each designed to deal with a specific kind of mission, are introduced and separately tested. The first stabilizes the quad-rotor over a landing pad on the ground; it extracts the 3-dimensional position using homography estimation and derives translational velocity by optical flow calculation. The second combines colour-extraction and line-detection algorithms to control the quad-rotor s 3-dimensional position and achieves forward velocity regulation during a road-following task.
In order to estimate the translational-dynamical characteristics of the quad-rotor (relative position and translational velocity) as they evolve within a building or other unstructured, GPS-deprived environment, imaging, inertial and altitude sensors are combined in a state observer. The text give the reader a current view of the problems encountered in UAV control, specifically those relating to quad-rotor flying machines and it will interest researchers and graduate students working in that field. The vision-based control strategies presented help the reader to a better understanding of how an imaging system can be used to obtain the information required for performance of the hovering and navigation tasks ubiquitous in rotored UAV operation."

This book examines distributed video coding (DVC) and multiple description coding (MDC), two novel techniques designed to address the problems of conventional image and video compression coding. Covering all fundamental concepts and core technologies, the chapters can also be read as independent and self-sufficient, describing each methodology in sufficient detail to enable readers to repeat the corresponding experiments easily. Topics and features: provides a broad overview of DVC and MDC, from the basic principles to the latest research; covers sub-sampling based MDC, quantization based MDC, transform based MDC, and FEC based MDC; discusses Sleplian-Wolf coding based on Turbo and LDPC respectively, and comparing relative performance; includes original algorithms of MDC and DVC; presents the basic frameworks and experimental results, to help readers improve the efficiency of MDC and DVC; introduces the classical DVC system for mobile communications, providing the developmental environment in detail.

Exploring theories and applications developed during the last 30 years, Digital Geometry in Image Processing presents a mathematical treatment of the properties of digital metric spaces and their relevance in analyzing shapes in two and three dimensions. Unlike similar books, this one connects the two areas of image processing and digital geometry, highlighting important results of digital geometry that are currently used in image analysis and processing.

The book discusses different digital geometries in multi-dimensional integral coordinate spaces. It also describes interesting properties of the geometries, including metric and topological properties, shapes of circles and spheres, proximity to Euclidean norms, and number theoretic representations of geometric objects such as straight lines and circles. The authors all active researchers in image processing and digital geometry demonstrate how these concepts and properties are useful in various techniques for image processing and analysis. In particular, the book covers applications in object representation and shape analysis.

With many figures (some in color) and end-of-chapter exercises, this book provides an in-depth, unified account of digital metrics, the characterization of digital curves and straight lines, and their uses in shape analysis. It gives you insight on the latest two- and three-dimensional image processing applications."

"Foundations of Large-Scale Multimedia Information Management and Retrieval - Mathematics of Perception"" "covers knowledge representation and semantic analysis of multimedia data and scalability in signal extraction, data mining, and indexing. The book is divided into two parts: Part I - Knowledge Representation and Semantic Analysis focuses on the key components of mathematics of perception as it applies to data management and retrieval. These include feature selection/reduction, knowledge representation, semantic analysis, distance function formulation for measuring similarity, and multimodal fusion. Part II - Scalability Issues presents indexing and distributed methods for scaling up these components for high-dimensional data and Web-scale datasets. The book presents some real-world applications and remarks on future research and development directions.

The book is designed for researchers, graduate students, and practitioners in the fields of Computer Vision, Machine Learning, Large-scale Data Mining, Database, and Multimedia Information Retrieval.

Dr. Edward Y. Chang was a professor at the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of California at Santa Barbara, before he joined Google as a research director in 2006. Dr. Chang received his M.S. degree in Computer Science and Ph.D degree in Electrical Engineering, both from Stanford University.

Work over the shoulder of Chris Georgenes, renowned Flash expert and explore the myriad of tips and tricks based on real-life working methods to help you work faster and more efficiently and to budget Gain the best possible results from solutions to the common problems of animated shorts, cartoons or mobile application development while remaining competitive in a diverse market with the tried and true methods of a professional animator. New Adobe cheats and examples with practical solutions for the busy animator with new or revised content on Action Script, Flash for mobile applications, specifically for Android development, as well as a focus on an improved physics engine. Everything you need to explore the new functionality of Flash

This unique text/reference provides a coherent and comprehensive overview of all aspects of video analysis of humans. Broad in coverage and accessible in style, the text presents original perspectives collected from preeminent researchers gathered from across the world. In addition to presenting state-of-the-art research, the book reviews the historical origins of the different existing methods, and predicts future trends and challenges. Features: with a Foreword by Professor Larry Davis; contains contributions from an international selection of leading authorities in the field; includes an extensive glossary; discusses the problems associated with detecting and tracking people through camera networks; examines topics related to determining the time-varying 3D pose of a person from video; investigates the representation and recognition of human and vehicular actions; reviews the most important applications of activity recognition, from biometrics and surveillance, to sports and driver assistance.

Discover everything you want to know about Photoshop Elements 10 in this easy to use guide, from the most essential tasks that you'll want to perform, to solving the most common problems you'll encounter. Photoshop Elements 10 In Simple Stepscovers every practical aspect of using Photoshop Elements on your PC or laptop; from understanding the user interface and essential tools, to basic retouching and adjusting of photographs, to advanced techniques using filters, layers and special effects, through to organizing and sharing your photographs. This book is filled with easy to understand practical tasks that will help you to achieve immediate results. This series of vibrant books will teach you exactly what you need to know using A friendly, visual approach Easy-to-understand language Practical hands-on tasks Full-colour large format screenshots To build your confidence and help you to get the most out of your computer, practical hints, tips and shortcuts feature on every page: ALERT!- Explains and provides practical solutions to the most commonly encountered problems HOT TIPS- Time and effort saving shortcuts SEE ALSO... - Points you to other related tasks and information DID YOU KNOW? - Additional features to explore WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? - Jargon and technical terms explained in plain English

Discover everything you want to know about Photoshop CS6 in this easy to use guide, from the most essential tasks that you'll want to perform, to solving the most common problems you'll encounter. Photoshop CS6 In Simple Stepscovers every practical aspect of using Photoshop CS6 on your PC or laptop; from getting acquainted with essential Photoshop CS6 tools, to basic retouching and adjusting, through to advanced techniques using selections, layers and masks. This book is filled with easy to understand practical tasks that will help you to achieve immediate results. This series of vibrant books will teach you exactly what you need to know using A friendly, visual approach Easy-to-understand language Practical hands-on tasks Full-colour large format screenshots To build your confidence and help you to get the most out of your computer, practical hints, tips and shortcuts feature on every page: ALERT!- Explains and provides practical solutions to the most commonly encountered problems HOT TIPS- Time and effort saving shortcuts SEE ALSO... - Points you to other related tasks and information DID YOU KNOW? - Additional features to explore WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?- Jargon and technical terms explained in plain English

This is a must for the serious Photoshop user! Power, Speed & Automation explores how to customize and automate Photoshop to increase your speed and productivity. With numerous step-by-step instructions, the authors-two of Adobe's own software developers!- walk you through the steps to best tailor Photoshop's interface to your personal workflow; write and apply Actions; and use batching and scripts to process large numbers of images quickly and automatically. You will learn how to build your own dialogs and panels to improve your production workflows in Photoshop, the secrets of changing keyboard shortcuts and menus, and ways to tune your system for optimal performance. Writing new processes using JavaScript is also covered, as well as leveraging Variables with data sets. Learn how to get more work done? more easily and quickly? with this essential guide! *This book can be used with any version of Photoshop through CS6!*